Notes from a Northwest Leaper

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Month: February 2013

Do you get excited about going to the grocery store? Is it okay with you if you loiter about the market for over an hour? Does your market lure you in, whisper to you? Sing a siren’s song? Do you linger in aisles and query the produce mongers and the beauty manager and the plant specialist? Do you debate–for whole minutes–over which thumb-sized cheese chunk you will drop in your cart? (Answer: all of them.) Skim the bulk section for at least five minutes, imagining what you will eat (despite your grocery list) over the next few days? Is there excitement as you scoop lentilles du puy into your former marinara jar?

They are so…*sigh*…beautiful. All layered and moody green-blackish.

Do you buy locally grown savoy cabbage because it’s so breathtaking that you can not go home without it, even though half a head of cabbage sits patiently in your crisper at home? Do you ask your husband, and the cashier, Isn’t it beautiful?, as though you’re pointing out a sunset or an infant’s smile.

Do you and your partner-in-crime stock up on dark chocolate when it’s on sale because the cupboard isn’t complete without a full catalogue of cocoa?

Do you squee in delight–and imagine decorating a room in the palette–as you crack open pistachio shells? Who would have thought greens and purples and taupes could look so rich together?

Does the inside of a grapefruit remind of you bacon? Sans the fat. Plus the vitamins?

Do you love to try out a new recipe–Heidi or Deb (oh god–those brownies!) or Molly–but tweak it just a bit, given what you have on hand, and your current seasonal obsession (still grapefruit) to bring to a dinner gathering?

Do you–at least once a month–revel so deeply in your purchases that you want to photograph your market loot? Collards and apples and pears and leeks and beets and cabbages and kales all from your little farming valley?